Multi-instrumentalist Gabriel de Leon has always been considered to be one of the brightest Malaysian musicians of his generation. From playing in a family band to studying at the world-renowned Berklee College of Music, he leaves a mark on every music project he takes under his wing.
Gabriel de Leon is a composer, multi-instrumentalist, arranger, producer and musician who has worked continentally from Asia, Europe and North America. Based in Los Angeles, he began his career playing in a family band to studying in Boston's world-famous school, Berklee College of Music dual-majoring in Contemporary Writing & Production and Jazz Composition. Since venturing into music production, he has incorporated all the elements of his musical experience to make him a Swiss army knife in the music industry, writing music for film, video games and TV, as well as performing on the big stage. He strives to make a meaningful impact on people through his music.
COMPOSITION
An accomplished composer, Gabriel has seen his work featured on many occasions, such as writing the music on the video game “Muffin Tour Legacy” by Battery Cake, as well as scoring for Carly Chaikin’s (Mr. Robot) short film, “Blind Date” that was featured at film festivals such as the Beverly Hills Film Festival and the Portland Film Festival. His work with music production libraries such as Droid Mafia has garnered placements on international TV such as "Vanderpump Villa", "Halloween Wars" “Steel Buddies - Stahlharte Geschäfte” (DMAX). He also writes for Bleeding Fingers, Endless Noise and Transported Tracks, three music libraries based in Los Angeles. In 2018, he composed the overture to the musical “Abbie and The A-Team” by Nancy Penland Jenster that premiered in his hometown of Penang, Malaysia. That same year, he was musical director and conductor for four shows of a local production of The Wizard of Oz by the Prince of Wales Island International School.
Gabriel began his professional career in composition in 2021 when he met a regular collaborator in Eric Marks, owner and CEO of Transported Audio. With Eric, he has worked on "Blind Date" and "Muffin Tour Legacy". Since then, Gabriel has played an integral role in the forthcomings of a rapidly growing production library called "Transported Tracks", a boutique library for trailer and trailerized tracks. In addition, as part of the newly-founded music division of Transported Audio called Transported Music, he is now part of the management team.
Shortly after moving to Los Angeles, Gabriel has been involved in numerous projects. On Mikel Hurwitz's score of The Wedding Contract (Hallmark), he was the technical score assistant. He also has orchestrated several scores by David Bertok. In the fall of 2023, he was brought on by the Bleeding Fingers team as a freelance composer. He has also collaborated with Shabir Music Asia on their music video for "The Light", the theme song for Singaporean series, "Game Changers".
As lead composer, Gabriel's first feature film is set to release, entitled "Written In The Sand", (dir. Robert Vaughn). His work can be heard on several short films as well, with his first project release in early 2024 - "Fetish", directed by Joesephine Kim, followed by two more films, "Cheyenne" (dir. Hari Iyer) and "JACK" (dir. Itai Rembaum).
His collaborations with R&B artist Gareth.T (Hong Kong) have proven to create a lasting impact as well, with contributions for arrangements in 緊急聯絡人 (translated to emergency contact in English), as well as two other arrangements for his live appearance at the Hong Kong Stadium, where Inter Miami CF and Lionel Messi played a friendly with the Hong Kong All Star XI. Continuing in Hong Kong's Canto-pop world, he has gone on to arrange strings for 容祖兒 (translated to 9 Seconds in English) by Joey Yung.
OTHER VENTURES
With his background in performance, Gabriel is a multi-instrumentalist who focuses on violin and drum set performance. Prominent artists he has performed with include Tony Succar, David Fiuczynski, Arnie Roth, Nicole Johänntgen, Az Samad, Aisha Retno, Lalah Hathaway, Gayathri Krishnan, Anastasya Poetri, Thomas Ng, and The Penang Philharmonic Orchestra. Several notable venues at which Gabriel has performed include the Toyota Arena (Ontario, CA), Esplanade: Theatres on The Bay (Singapore, Singapore), the Saint Joseph Parish Bamboo Organ Church (Las Piñas, the Philippines) and Boston Symphony Hall (Boston, MA). As a violinist with the Berklee Contemporary Symphony Orchestra, he played a part in the 2019 Distant Worlds: Music from Final Fantasy tour. The music was led by Grammy-winning conductor Arnie Roth, as he toured the world and made a stop at the Boston Symphony Hall. The music in the program was composed by globally celebrated composers, namely Nobuo Uematsu and Yoko Shimamura, the latter of whom was in attendance. He has also recorded for artists such as Prithvi Prajosh “Loved by You”, Francesca Castro “Something About You” & “Would You Be So Kind”, Anastasya Poetri “Fool’s Fantasy”, Cristian Tamblay “El Quinto Relato” and Justin Adijanto “Paradise”.
As a producer, he represents himself under the moniker “L.U.C.A.S”, a derivative of his second name and childhood name. Since creating his own music as an artist in 2021, he has released three singles, “Twisted Summer” (2020), “Lily” (2020) and “Summer Song feat. Boba Lee & moreofthem” (2021). Several months after the release of Lily, it was featured on local Malaysian radio, Hitz.fm as part of the Hitz Met 10 show as a promising original Malaysian song in the English Language. He has also produced for other US based artists such as Anastasya Poetri, David Timothy and TESS.
In the summer of 2023, Gabriel began his journey in relatively unfamiliar waters - post-production sound. Brought on as an additional dialogue editor, Culver City-based film production company entrusted Gabriel to lend an extra hand in a project involving a non-disclosed top-tech industry client. From that experience, he has gone on to work on several other projects, including a new mini-series, "Ally Chia Begins" as sound editor and re-recording mixer.
Gabriel was the co-founder of Berklee Budaya, a team that seeks to promote Malaysian music at Berklee, as well as on an international level. In 2020, the Berklee Budaya Production Team hosted a concert at The Caf, 160 Massachusetts Avenue, a spectacle of music selections written by Malaysians, arranged by Malaysians. Due to its success and positive response from audiences, Gabriel lead Berklee Budaya as director to organize an online concert series that premiered on March 20 2021, about a year since their first concert. For both concerts, he arranged music by internationally renowned Malaysian artists such as Yuna and Noraniza Idris.